“He was everything I was looking for, or needed or wanted in my life,” the 27 Dresses star told Britain’s Sunday Times. “He’s just so easy to be around. He lightens up the room and lightens my load.”

In fact, the 29-year-old Grey’s Anatomy star already has babies on the brain. “I think he’d prefer to wait a little more time, but I kind of wouldn’t,” she told the paper, adding that it would be “foolish” to waste their current career opportunities. “I think we’ll meet somewhere in the middle.”

When it comes to maintaining her famous figure, Heigl relies on that same spirit of compromise. “I’ve just discovered if I don’t eat bread or pasta, my stomach doesn’t feel so bloated all the time,” she said. “I try to eat healthy, but I think if you cut out every wonderful thing you love, what’s the point? I’d rather feel sick.”

Overcoming Family Tragedy

Heigl may seem to have it all these days – a rock-star hubby, a hit TV series and comparisons to America’s Sweetheart Julia Roberts. (“I can t help but feel that’s a little insulting to Julia Roberts,” she joked to the Times.) But her life wasn’t always so picture perfect.

When she was only 7, her older brother Jason died from injuries he sustained when he was thrown from the back of a pickup truck.

“For a long time, [Jason’s death] made me afraid of being too happy because things happen so unexpectedly,” she said. “Your world can change and every aspect of your life is different.”

In fact, Heigl said, she’s still learning to let down her defenses. “[His death] made me afraid when good things happen. It made me brace against it that little bit,” she explained. “I’m trying hard not to do that any more. It doesn’t make something terrible easier – and I don’t want to waste my happiness.”